1 Perris Auto Speedway is taking steps to get more families to its weekly races and, perhaps, stir interest in the next generation.

The half-mile clay oval in Riverside County will lower ticket prices for teens ages 13-18 for the upcoming season. Beginning with the USAC/CRA Sprint Car and California Lightning Sprint Car Sokola Shootout on March 12, teens will get in for $5 with valid school identification.

“We want to help out the families and we also want to get more youngsters into the track,” Speedway promoter Don Kazarian said. “This will help mom and dad who bring the kids to the races and it will make it easier for teens who are looking for something to do with their friends on a Saturday night.

“These days, there are very few places where teens can spend just $5 for admission.”

It should be noted tickets for children 6-12 also is $5. Active members of the military and seniors age 65 and over will receive a $5 discount on Sprint Car nights while general admission for PASSCAR Stock Car shows and the Nights of Destruction are $9.

2 Perhaps the lasting image of last week’s NASCAR Sprint Media Tour was Richard Petty’s smile during his press conference in Charlotte Motor Speedway’s NASCAR Nationwide Series garage. The King is back in the game.

“We had a pretty rough time last year,” Petty said to the assembled media, “but everybody stayed with us. The sponsors stayed with us through the winter and came back on board for the new season.

“I have to give our crew a lot of credit. For the last five or six races, they didn’t know if they were going to have a job the next week. But they stepped it up, the drivers stepped it up and we ended up with a pretty good season.”

Indeed, the fight for survival was out of sight for the most part, truly a battle in board rooms. And for NASCAR, it was a good thing Petty prevailed.

What would NASCAR be without Petty?

Thanks largely to his name and what it means to the sport, Petty has brought his operation back from the brink of extinction. His major accomplishment was to secure two investment companies toward the end of 2010. That allowed him to buy out the Richard Petty Motorsports asset from the Gillete family and become chairman of the reorganized group.

“I was on the sidelines the past few years,” Petty said, “but I’m back.”

To go forward, RPM cut back from four to two cars driven by A.J. Allmendinger and Marcos Ambrose. Kasey Kahne bolted for Red Bull and Elliott Sadler will drive Nationwide cars for Kevin Harvick.

Best Buy, Valvoline, U.S. Air Force, WIX Filters, Reynolds and Paralyzed Veterans of America will back Allmendinger while Stanley Tools and DeWalt will sponsor Ambrose.

RPM has Ford in its camp.

“When Richard reached out to us last year, there was not a moment of consideration on our part,” said Jamie Allison, director of Ford North America Motorsports. “Our chairman, Edsel Ford, absolutely felt in his heart that it was the right thing to do, to make sure the legacy of Richard Petty continues.”

3 It’s a question that seems to draw national attention very few years or so and always with the same conclusion.

At question is the tax-exempt status of NHRA. However, this year the Washington law firm Caplin & Drysdale, on behalf of an anonymous client, is pushing the complaint that contends NHRA’s “activities mimic those organized by for-profit automobile entertainment companies.”

“Public information reveals that the NHRA operates like a commercial business by providing specific services to its members – whether in the form of prize money to winners or payments to race track operators or other private groups benefiting from the racing events,” Marcus S. Owens, a senior member of the firm and former director of the exempt organizations division at the IRS, said in a press release.

The release also targeted compensation for NHRA, notably president Tom Compton and board chairman Dallas Gardner.

“Based on NHRA’s 2008 tax filings, two of the Association’s executives received compensation well beyond industry standards,” the release stated, noting Compton received $771,632 and Gardner $319,073 “for one single hour of work per week.”

The Glendora-based sanctioning body was quick to respond.

“NHRA was granted exempt status by the IRS decades ago and has operated accordingly ever since,” it said in a statement. “Since its formation in 1951, NHRA has operated to further its mission of preserving and promoting the sport of drag racing and improving safety in the sport. Claims that NHRA is not operating properly are baseless and not supported by any action from the IRS.”

Regardless of one’s opinion on the matter, NHRA has endured this challenge several times.

4 Because this year’s Daytona 500 marks the 10th anniversary of the death of legendary driver Dale Earnhardt, there will be much focus on his life over the next three weeks.

Jim Downing, co-founder of HANS Performance Products, has provided keen insight into the events that led to Earnhardt’s death on the final turn of the race. The HANS (Heads And Neck Restraint) Device is now mandatory in many race disciplines.

However, that wasn’t always the case. Earnhardt’s death accelerated the use of the device.

HANS Performance Products had been selling the HANS Device since 1990. How did the fatal crash of Earnhardt Sr. affect the sales of the device?

“We went from selling 250 in 10 years to selling 250 in one week,” Downing said. “Ultimately, we sold about 3,000 in 2001. We had known that the HANS Device was a safety breakthrough from our sled testing and from the feedback we got from members of the medical community who were active in racing such as Dr. Terry Trammell and Dr. Steve Olvey.

“When guys like that understand it, then you know your conclusions about the HANS device being a safety breakthrough are correct.”

Downing, however, is not sure the HANS device would have saved Earnhardt.

“Re-constructing accidents is an extremely difficult and complex chore. We rely on the professional experience of others and in this case there were different opinions by experts about the cause of the fatal injuries,” Downing said. “With that in mind, I believe that when Dale Earnhardt’s car hit the wall and the belts from his safety harness were loaded by the impact, a HANS device would have kept his head back. That likely would have produced a better outcome under the different scenarios that have been proposed by experts.

“This is what it seems like to me, but we don’t really know for sure.”

5 Clearing out the local notebook:

Two of the country’s foremost racing public address announcers, Bruce Flanders and Larry Huffman, will work the race season this summer at Inland Motorcycle Speedway.

Flanders was the original voice of IMS when it was the Wednesday night stop of the talent-rich Southern California weekly speedway circuit more than 20 years. Flanders, who returned in 2009 at Orange Show Speedway, is the long-time announcer at the Long Beach Grand Prix.

“Much like the big surf at Mentone Beach, I’m back,” Flanders said.

Huffman will continue working behind the scenes in an advertising and sponsorship role and will announce selected events.

Ryan Partridge of Rancho Cucamonga won the biggest race of his young career last week at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale by taking the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series Super Late Model event at the NASCAR Toyota All-Star Showdown.

The 22-year-old, who won the speedway’s truck division championship in 2010, led much of the 75-lap race after starting fifth. Partridge lost the lead briefly to Alex Haase on a lap 56 restart but regained the advantage eight laps later. He beat Haase of Las Vegas to the line by .748 seconds.